6 Smart Kitchen Appliances That Will Save You Time & Energy

Chances are you’ve heard of smart TVs and nearly everyone has a smartphone in their pocket these days. But did you know you can boost the intelligence of your kitchen, too? Yep, smart kitchen appliances have taken over – and for good reason! From smart fridges and blenders to smart microwaves, toasters, multicookers and even dishwashers, these smart kitchen gadgets can make life easier, cooking and cleaning faster – and they may even save you some money.

Want to know how you can smarten up every room in your home? Check out our smart home buying guide.

Smart fridges can have all sorts of clever functions to not only make life easier but also keep your food fresher for longer, reducing wastage and cutting down grocery bills. Some have Wi-Fi connectivity, allowing you to do things like see inside the fridge via a smartphone app when you’re out at the supermarket; others (we’re looking at you, LG Slim French Door Fridge) will let you adjust the temperature from the grocery store to prepare for a big haul that needs fast cooling. They can also send alerts to your device when the doors have been left open or when maintenance is needed.

Some smart fridges, such as the Haier 496L Bottom Mount Refrigerator, can be operated via a digital control panel and can adjust the temperature in individual drawers to keep produce like seafood and meat coolers. Others, such as Fisher & Paykel’s 569L French Door Fridge, not only offer individual humidity control in each of the storage bins and drawers, but also learn how you use your fridge over time to adjust the temperature, airflow and humidity, personalising it to you. Oh, and if you like to buy in bulk, check out the Samsung 458L Smart Bottom Mount Refrigerator – it has 34% more freezer space!

Let’s be real – toasting isn’t all that hard to begin with. But thanks to some very smart kitchen ideas, an expertly toasted slice of bread is now even easier to procure! Smart toasters can do a whole range of things to get you the perfect crunchy slice every time – some even feature a digital touchscreen so you can program what you’re toasting, from bagels to sourdough slices, and pre-pick your preferred level of brownness. We love the Breville Smart Toast range, which features a handy motorised ‘Lift & Look’ function so you can check on your toast’s progress without stopping the cycle, along with an LED progress indicator and one-touch lowering. 

As if multicookers weren’t ingenious enough devices, they’ve got even cleverer – making a smart multicooker one of the best additions you can make to your kitchen. (Psst – if you’ve been thinking about adding a multicooker to your kitchen, read our buying guide first.)

Tefal’s Cook4Me range is basically like having your very own personal kitchen assistant, with menu guides to help you cook delicious meals step-by-step, an ingredient bank of 150 pre-programmed recipes and a super-easy to use control panel. Easy? Yes. Practical? Definitely. But the Ninja Foodi Smart Lid 14-in-1 Multicooker is the king of smart multicookers, with options to create everything from a family meal to a beautifully baked cake, crusty bread and the perfect roast chicken (right down to the crispy skin). Grab one of these smart kitchen gadgets and you’ll wonder how you ever lived without it.

Yes, even your blender has had an intelligent upgrade – and no one does smart blending quite like Nutribullet, whose Smart Touch Triple Prep System features 3 functionalities using only 1 base - you can blend, extract, chop, slice and knead your delicious creations.

Similarly, Ninja has a great range of blenders, including their Intellisense Kitchen System blender, which features a smart touchscreen display and can recognise which attachment is on the base, offering up the matching menu of Smart Programs to get your blend right every time.

When dishwashers were invented, they revolutionised kitchens everywhere. Now the smart dishwasher is doing it all over again, with fab functions like Wi-Fi connectivity, remote cycle starting via smartphone apps, alerts when wash cycles are done, and even sensors that determine the load size and adjust the cleaning cycle accordingly.

Bosch’s offerings use LoadSensor tech to only use as much water as a load needs and AquaSensor to reuse water where it can, saving up to 20% per load, while many of Miele’s washers are Wi-Fi capable, meaning you can connect them to a smartphone app and turn on a load while you’re out so the dishes are sparkly clean by the time you’re home.

No smart kitchen is complete without a smart microwave. These clever things can do all sorts of neat tricks that make your life that much easier, from scanning barcodes on food to suggest cooking times, to downloading cooking instructions, detecting moisture levels and more. You can also operate some smart microwaves via an app on your phone or tablet (and receive alerts when food is ready), or with your voice-control systems like Amazon Alexa and Google Play. Handy, right?!

LG’s NeoChef range of smart microwaves feature sensor cooking – that is, the appliance senses humidity levels during cooking to determine when your food is done. Once it's ready, the microwave turns itself off to prevent overcooking. Many of the Panasonic smart microwaves do the same, utilising their aptly named ‘Genius Sensor’, which can also calculate the perfect power and time for defrosting in a flash. Just press ‘Start’ and it’ll sort it out for you.